"If
Kiang-Nan Fall, A Hundred Wild Geese (Pe-Yen) Will Make Their
Appearance." This, It Is Added, Was Not Understood Till The Generalissimo
Peyen Chingsiang Made His Appearance On The Scene.
"Punning prophecies
of this kind are so common in Chinese history, that the above is only
worth noticing in connection with Marco Polo's story." (N. and Q., China
and Japan, vol.
Ii. p. 162.)
But I should suppose that the Persian historian Wassaf had also heard a
bungled version of the same story, which he tells in a pointless manner of
the fortress of Sinafur (evidently a clerical error for Saianfu, see
below, ch. lxx.): "Payan ordered this fortress to be assaulted. The
garrison had heard how the capital of China had fallen, and the army of
Payan was drawing near. The commandant was an experienced veteran who had
tasted all the sweets and bitters of fortune, and had borne the day's heat
and the night's cold; he had, as the saw goes, milked the world's cow dry.
So he sent word to Payan: 'In my youth' (here we abridge Wassaf's
rigmarole) 'I heard my father tell that this fortress should be taken by a
man called Payan, and that all fencing and trenching, fighting and
smiting, would be of no avail. You need not, therefore, bring an army
hither; we give in; we surrender the fortress and all that is therein.' So
they opened the gates and came down." (Wassaf, Hammer's ed., p. 41).
NOTE 6.
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